1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an optical measuring system, and more particularly, to an optical measuring system suitable for conducting reflective optical measurement and transmittive-absorptive optical measurement on a same assay table.
2. Description of Related Art
The photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopic analysis is a powerful and non-destructive technique to test the optical characteristics of luminous semiconductor materials. Furthermore, many material parameters including doped impurity kinds, band-gap values, activation energy of impurity and the like can be revealed from an optical spectrum by analyzing the PL data, and the constituents of a compound can be estimated from peak energies of a luminescence spectrum.
In order to observe the portions without spontaneous fluorescence in biometric tissues, it is needed to add fluorescence dye. The fluorescence protein technique is a significant invention in fluorescence-adding field recently. Fluorescence protein has no biological toxicity and can be compiled in deoxyribose nucleic acid (DNA) of target cells so as to be exhibited. If fluorescence protein is compiled with other proteins, the exhibition intensity and occurring positions of specific proteins in cells can be tracked by means of fluorescence intensity. In an instrument of measuring fluorescence reactions, a light source and an optical detector are usually disposed at a same side of the instrument, where the fluorescence substance of specimen is stimulated by the light source so as to measure the fluorescence reaction of the specimen by using the optical detector. The above-mentioned optical measurement technique by disposing a light source and an optical detector at a same side of the specimen is termed as reflective measurement.
The light absorption analysis is also broadly applicable to testing various materials where some substances having specific absorption spectrums are utilized. By illuminating a specimen with light having a specific wavelength range, probing the optical spectrum of the specimen transmitted by the light and comparing the spectrum of incident light with the spectrum of the transmitted light, the absorption spectrum of the specimen can be revealed. In an instrument for measuring light absorption however, a light source and an optical detector are usually disposed at both sides of a specimen. By illuminating a specimen with the light source, the optical detector is able to measure the optical spectrum of the specimen transmitted by the light. The above-mentioned optical measurement technique by disposing a light source and an optical detector at different sides of the specimen is termed as transmittive-absorptive measurement.
Due to the application demands of nanometer materials and biochemical analytes today, where the samples have numerous kinds but small amount per batch for testing, and the novelty of the sample materials, in particular, in terms of the application of biochemical analyses, there are some biochemical ferments in addition to protein and DNA, therefore, to develop an optical testing system with high-sensitivity and high-dynamic range which is able to simultaneously obtain some results provided for evaluating material structure, components and quality thereof by conducting PL analyses and optical absorption analyses is one of vital measurement technique projects in advancing nanometer and biometric materials.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,074,616, 6,830,731B1 and 6,194,222B1 provide fluorescence optical testing methods with high-sensitivity and high-dynamic range, which target to conduct fluorescent marking with different contents on the fluorescent marking substance of specimen to suit biometric marking proteins with different contents. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,628,382B2 and 6,809,826B2 provide a fluorescent radiation and optical absorption testing method, where the optical testing is conducted by using different assay tables.
Usually, a reflective measurement and a transmittive-absorptive measurement on a specimen are conducted by using different assay tables, respectively, that is, a single assay table is in charge of an optical measurement only. World Patent WO9,214,137 provides a device for measuring fluorescent radiation and optical absorption. However, the device is applicable to liquid specimen only, which limits the applications thereof and can not be used for testing diverse biometric material, such as biochip.